Land Of Peace & Palms

A trail of shimmering bubbles in our wake, the hull of the Hirokawa Maru slowly takes form as we descend first as a faint shadow against deep blue Pacific waters, and then, as we draw closer, as a towering darkness that threatens to suck up all the light. As my eyes adjust, the vessel’s sheer size begins to reveal itself; at 156 meters long, the Hirokawa Mari isn’t the largest of the wrecks which litter Ironbottom Sound, a strip of water between the islands of Guadalcanal.